Question by Charles L: If you’re consciousness is contained within the brain, why do people believe in an afterlife?
You’re emotions and consciousness are chemical processes within the brain. When you die, you’re brain ceases to function and rots away. Good bye consciousness. So, unless some god keeps a carbon copy of you’re emotions to activate upon you’re death, you’re gone. Why is this so hard to understand? And if god does have an afterlife, why not just have us there in the first place? We don’t really learn anything here about the afterlife, or how to live in it.
Best answer:
Answer by El Bandido
Cause people believe anything they’re told to
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
Because they pretend that it exists outside of the brain.
In a pretend world anything is possible.
Exactly! Sad though that I highly doubt any theist will be able to comprehend what you just said 🙁
Because Imaginationland is a wondrous place.
Because they have good enjoyment now and want to born as human being again!
Many (most?) people believe that the physical brain doesn’t explain everything about consciousness.
Actually, your consciousness is *limited* by your physical brain. You’re unable to recall details of past lives, and for that matter what you wore to work two weeks ago, or most of your entire life from the time you were born. When you’ve moved on to another dimension your consciousness is free of the physical restraints you had on Earth.
Oh well just because you say so it must be true, huh? How is one to prove what happens after life. How can one be so arrogant to believe they know what happens without absolute proof? Being so closed minded only demonstrates illogical thinking and ignorance.
We don’t know what it is that causes the consciousness to exist.
A. Your question is premised on a view of consciousness that is not accepted by all of the serious researchers on the subject. In fact, I think it’s fair to say that they would tell you that consciousness is a poorly understood phenom.
B. Assuming that you live on, it’s no more miraculous that you have consciousness in some other way than that you had it in the first instance.
Well yuo say we dont learn anything here – but we do. When yuo were a child and growing up, did yuo not learn right from wrong? Some humans are still “children” (worse) and are still learning. I believe they all will one day.
One of the reasons i believe there is more to us than just this “body” or “brain” is that if everything was purely physical, then theoretically, yuo could bring people back to life, much like fixing a car. But you cant fix a human in the way you can a car as we have a spirit within us that is taken away at death. Thus the body cannot live without a spirit.
Hey im not religious, but do believe there is more to life than “this”
People meditate to expand that tiny idea of consciousness. And once they do, they NEVER want to go back to what you are speaking about.
People believe in an afterlife because of wishful thinking or because they have been indoctrinated from a young age.
I think we believe in some for of afterlife because it is a huge mystery to everyone. I mean, it’s not like we can ever have proof, right? Many people have faith in their religion and many religions believe in some form of an afterlife. Besides, how depressing would it be to believe that what we have here on earth is it and then you really are finished? No point to our existence, no lessons leading up to a perfection of our souls…nothing. It’s pretty bleak when you think of it like that.
Human beings are limited in what they are able to comprehend just like cats and cows and worms are. There are many things that we can not grasp even if some being smart enough to understand them tried to explain. Try explaining algebra to your cat. Though humans like to think that they are supreme in some way we only get away with it because there is no one around to tell us different. When you look at the spectrum of intelligence and the imaginary line we call ‘sentience’, we are only ONE STEP over that line as a species with an infinite distance to go.
Insanity
All developed societies throughout the ages have believed in some sort of afterlife. I believe it is a coping mechanism of some sort, it’s alot more reassuring to go through life trying to do the right thing in hopes of a better life somewhere else, than to go through life feeling it’s pointless. To answer your question straight up, nobody knows what happens to your conciousness when you die, and anyone that claims to is a fool. I once heard somewhere that religion is not for people who don’t want to go to hell, it is for people that have been put through hell.
Just my opinion for what its worth: I think our consciousness is in our soul and the brain is just a computer to deal with things in every day life in this life time.
They are connected with your brain but they aren’t in your brain, which is why the word ‘mind’ was coined.